There's a Battlefield 3 interview on VG247 talking with lead designer David Goldfarb, discussing the single-player campaign in the military shooter sequel. Also, Rock, Paper, Shotgun has news that while there will be civilians in Battlefield 3, players will not be able to fire upon them, which recalls the controversial "no Russian" mission in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 that involved a civilian massacre. They have word on the topic of collateral damage from DICE executive producer Patrick Bach:

“In a game where it’s more authentic, when you have a gun in your hand and a child in front of you what would happen? Well the player would probably shoot that child.”

This is something Bach wants to avoid, because while the choice to do that ‘bad’ thing would have been the player’s, “We would be the ones to be blamed. We have to build our experiences so we don’t put the player in experiences where they can do bad things.” While not explicitly mentioned, the spectre of Modern Warfare 2 and its notorious ‘No Russian’ level seemed to this correspondent to loom large here.

So, Bach admitted that there was a degree of self-censoring necessary to limit potentially disagreeable player behaviour. “Me personally, I’m trying to stay away from civilians in games like BF because I think people will do bad. I don’t want to see videos on the internet where people shoot civilians. That’s something I will sanitise by removing that feature from the game.”

Importantly, “That doesn’t mean that I don’t want people to feel that war is not good,… We are trying to do something that is more mature. Mature not being gore –some people confuse the two. That’s childish actually, to want more blood.”

“In a game where it’s more authentic, when you have a gun in your hand and a child in front of you what would happen? Well the player would probably shoot that child.”

The player COULD shoot that child. Wouldn't it be more mature to have in game consequences for shooting civillians? Say you are haunted by it thoughout the game when you kill civillians or you get repremanded by your superiors for it? Or you create people who want revenge. Get put on trial for war crimes etc? Those are far more mature ways to handle it, all you need to do is create some consequences and you have a much more mature game.

I don’t want to see videos on the internet where people shoot civilians

Yeah are you living under a rock? Why do you think so many civilians die in wars? It's because the combatants SHOOT them. Look at Afghanistan and Iraq, we kill civilians and to sanitize that from a game that is supposedly based on "modern" warfare is whitewash that ignores reality. So much for a realistic game.

Importantly, “That doesn’t mean that I don’t want people to feel that war is not good,… We are trying to do something that is more mature. Mature not being gore –some people confuse the two. That’s childish actually, to want more blood.”Yes, because depicting a non sanitized version of war is something that must be avoided at all costs. You don't want people to feel thta war is not good? Well that may be why you want to portray war in such a sanitized manor.

He should have been honest and said "We are afraid of negative publicity and that is why we aren't allowing civillians to be shot." Not the bullshit quoted.